I found the seminar following the second theme to be significantly more complicated than that of the first week, attributed mostly to the fact that the concept I found relatively easily understandable (Enlightenment, dialectic and myth) being glossed over, and most time being spent on the one I found rather hard - that of nominalism.
From what I now understand, the main difference between nominalism and its counterpart realism, are their attitude towards universals. If, say, a realist were to see a pen, he would not only see an object that can be used to write in a certain color using ink, but would also apply to it the universal concept of a 'pen' - thus placing it in the same category as other pens. This would, then, negate certain specific attributes of this specific instance of a pen; i.e. it would be considered the same as a pen that wrote in a red color; a pen that was made out of metal or a pen that - to bring up a very sensitive age-old rivalry - was a twisty-bottom model rather than a clicky-top.
In nominalism, then, one does away with such universals, merely seeing the individual pen by it's individual characteristics; i.e. being used to write, producing blue ink, being made out of plastic, and using a clicky-top to open it. It is then seperate from other instances of a pen, not by definition being more or less related to them as it would be to e.g. a marker or a pencil.
5 comments:
Nice reflections! I found that even though it's a tad short, and you don't cover much, it's still an interesting read! What I was really missing from both your post is actually how Adorno & Horkeimer views the revolutionary potential in culture. Did you not understand it or did you simply forget about it? Anyhow I'm going to drop my two cents on that very question:
Adorno and Horkheimer says that, in the capitalism of America, people given freedom will only drown in it. Americans were so blinded by the liberalism that they didn't use it. That is to say that they don't think it has revolutionary potential, but rather that it can hold people back and work against them.
Keep it up!
I think you summed up the differences between realism and nominalism very well. It occurred to me also that we spent very little time discussing the other concepts. I think dialectic would have interesting to discuss further, since it's one of those concepts you don't normally think to put a word on. But once you put the word "dialectic" on the simple concept on putting arguments against one-another to arrive at new conclusions, suddenly you can begin thinking of what the alternatives would have been and why we happen to use this model.
I like that you try to explain nominalism and realism with an example. I also noticed that we spent most of the time talking about nominalism. At the seminar we didn’t talk at all about dialectic and we talk for a while about aura. I think that those meanings are also interesting, and even though there were easier to understand than nominalism, I would have like it if we had discussed them under historical context. As for aura we talked about pieces of art that have aura and are possessed by few, probably rich, people. Nowadays the technology has evolved and we can reproduce art pieces, they may not have aura anymore but they are available for anyone to experience and to possess them. This is dignity of people that are not rich in the society. Fascism argues that no matter what, people belong to the social class that they were born, and that situation cannot change. The liberation of the art helped people to overcome this idea and to make progress.
Hi,
I have to say that I found this week's theme easier to follow compared to the first theme. In your reflection you summed up the concept of nominalism and realism very well. However, I would have loved to read more about your thoughts also on the other topics as I assume that the concept of nominalism was the one, which every seminar group discussed in-depth.
Hello !
I think you cover the issue of Nominalism and Realism quite well, your post makes it easy to understand the difference between both notion thanks to your example!
It would be great if you could link this to how the Enlightenment effectively represents a danger to Adorno and Horkheimer when linked with fascism, and also the views of both authors concerning mass culture? :-)
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